Sherwood Festival

At the last Coven Moot I recently held, one of the members showed me a lovely pottery potion vial, with a pentagram on the front. When I asked her where she bought it, she said from the Robin Hood Festival at Sherwood Forest.

I remember my sister telling me about this last year. They came over to this side of the country to visit and wanted to stay with us, unfortunately, we were away at Bloodstock at the time. Plus, I had seen something in the newspaper about it.

As Hubby and I had been wondering what to do on Saturday (neither of us felt like doing housework or gardening) we decided that it sounded like fun! We both love Sherwood and as its so close to us, we have explored quite a lot of it. In fact, I even got lost there once on a cold winters afternoon and I wondered if I would ever get out before dark.

It is a festival that is well worth attending if you live in the area and it seems tourists come from all over the world! I was quite surprised at the various accents and languages that were being spoken. The cost of parking was only £5.00 and there was no entry fee, so I think this was fairly reasonable. The entertainment was fantastic! With a range of stalls and vendors, selling home made products, such as pottery, jewellery, head-dresses, leather items, bows and arrows (of course) and many more forestry/craft related items. One of the stalls was selling hand made brooms, proper besoms. My darling husband bought me one, made of Sherwood Silver Birch and made in Sherwood that day. Her name, is of course Marian!

They had various performers throughout the forest, including lute players, harpists, drumming and bards. A stage had been erected at the Major Oak, where various shows, dancing and singing were enacted to entertain the crowds (and I have never seen Sherwood as busy!).

The main events however, were the Falconry Display and the Jousting Tourney. I was blown away by the beautiful birds of prey as they swooped after the lures, above children’s heads. But the Jousting, performed by Legends Medieval Stunt Team was brilliant!

It was like watching something you would see on TV. I had a silly grin on my face through the whole show, feeling like a child again. Of course, Robin Hood won and the Sheriff of Nottingham lost – you wouldn’t want to disappoint the kids now, would you? But their costumes, choreography, sword play and horsemanship was brilliant and well rehearsed.

I do believe that we shall be going again in the future and next time, I shall be wearing my medieval costume!